Miss Harman told the convivial awards lunch at Claridge's: 'I am never going to run to be Prime Minister.'

She is right. In this country people stand (Americans run) for election to a Commons seat. It is then up to the Queen to invite someone, usually a party leader, to form a Government.

Lunch was tournedos of beef with ox-cheek, then a fancy chocolate pud. Jolly good, too.

Speech: Lord Mandelson was awarded Politician of the Year

I stayed off the drink but the Ondarre rioja smelled heavenly.

Tory frontbencher Lady Warsi, to my left, was not drinking, either. One, she is Muslim. Two, she had a migraine. Three, she realised half-way through the main course that she was one of the award winners and had to prepare a few words which she could then present as extempore pearls. Lady Warsi, who has chubby cheeks almost as delicious as those of the ox we were eating, is only 38. This makes her the baby of the Lords. Or babe.

She was recently voted sexiest peer, although as she said, this is a relative judgment. 'Given that I still have my own teeth, it was not saying much.'

Former Pensions Secretary James Purnell, who nearly toppled Gordon Brown when he quit from the Cabinet this summer, won the Resignation of the Year award. As he made his way to the stage he was patted on the bottom by Lord Mandelson.

Speech of the Year went to an MEP, Daniel Hannan (Con), whose short oration attacking Mr Brown became an internet hit. There is something oddly shiny about Mr Hannan. He is neat and soaped to the point of overfastidious. Yet he gave an interesting speech of acceptance, faultlessly grammatical.

He described himself as 'a member of an ersatz parliament', said that 'most of the electorates of Europe would swap their MPs for ours' and argued that regulating the (mis)behaviour of MPs should be left to voters. By asking people like Sir Christopher Kelly to do the job, 'we demean and infantilise the electorate'.

Alistair Darling won Survivor of the Year and almost blinked with wonderment. 'As you know, I don't win many prizes,' said the Chancellor, Eeyore-ishly. His last prize had been when he was Transport Secretary and Truckers' Weekly magazine had voted him the most boring MP of the year. Twice. Of the economy, Mr Darling remarked: 'Things were going absolutely fine until I walked through the door of No 10.'

Andrew Tyrie (Con, Chichester) was Backbencher of the Year for his pursuit of the Government over CIA torture flights. There was a moment of pure John Le Carre when the bespectacled Mr Tyrie disclosed that he had been in the steamy showers at the RAC Club in Pall Mall one day, glasses off, when a stranger sidled up and told him to 'persist, if I were you'. He never saw this 'deep throat' again.

Finally it was Lord Mandelson's moment. The Spectator's engaging young editor, Fraser Nelson, made a boob and initially declared the winner was Mr Darling. Everyone knew this was wrong. I was watching Mandelson. Worry flittered across his face. Then he tried to assemble an expression of confused delight.

Mr Nelson corrected the matter and the Mandelsonian calm returned. On reaching the stage he stroked Mr Nelson's neck and then extracted a typed speech of acceptance. It contained some rather over-done pantomime villainy. All very droll, no doubt.

But when this man is Politician of the Year it may explain why the noble calling of government, the very notion of disinterested parliamentary service, is so mocked by the electorate.